1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a coin dispenser and a method of paying out coins. More particularly, the present invention relates to a coin dispenser applied to a coin-operated machine such as a gaming machine, and relates also to a coin pay-out method in which fraud can be detected in the operation of the coin-operated machine.
2. The Prior Art
A coin-operated machine is operated in response to the insertion of coins, tokens, medals or other disks (herein referred to as coins) into an inlet slot. Such coin-operated machines include slot machines, other gaming machines, vending machines and money-changing machines. A slot machine for example, incorporates a coin dispenser, which discharges coins, as stored in the slot machine, into a coin trough. At a discharge port of the coin dispenser, there is arranged a coin pay-out sensor, which is adapted to detect coins that pass through the discharge port, so as to send a detection signal to a pay-out counter. The counter counts these detection signals, and when the counted value becomes equal to the predetermined number of dividend coins, the discharge motor is stopped from rotating, which terminates the discharge of coins.
However, conventional coin dispensers are vulnerable to fraud committed by a fraudulent player on the pay-out sensor. To perpetrate such a fraud, a long flexible tool is inserted into the pay-out sensor through the trough in advance of a pay-out instruction. The sensor is thus kept insensitive to the coins, keeping the pay-out counter from stepping. In this way, when the pay-out counter counts no steps or counts steps fewer in number than the coins legitimately to be paid out, the player will receive extra coins not detected by the pay-out sensor, thus more coins than the dividend as actually won.